"Field Trips," 2/26/05

As an illo-watcher I could frankly stand to see less of Bruce McCall. His frequent New Yorker covers have an accomplished, period sameness about them: panoramic cityscapes recalling the '30s New Yorker covers of Witold Gordon, pronouncedly Hopperesque interiors. Each illo is rendered with the same miniaturist's attention to detail and premised on a weak joke, some mildly absurd conceit that never quite justifies the effort. Yesterday's Op-Art is McCall Lite (or perhaps McCall on a Tight Deadline), but as usual my issue isn't with the quality of the art, but with the lack of imagination. He depicts "alternative" strategies for getting the maligned West Side stadium built: Float it in the Hudson! Bury it under a nature reserve! Build it over Zabar's--or better yet, over the post office in MSG's backyard. It not that these proposals aren't funny, they're just nowhere near as funny as some the urban designs that have been seriously considered in Manhattan over the past century. Hell, floating sports facilities (pools, to be exact) actually operated on the Harlem and Hudson Rivers until 1935! If McCall wants to portray comic fantasias of New York, he should take care not to be outdone by reality. (P.S., because you must be dying to know: If I could choose a New Yorker cover artist to bring to the op-ed page, it would be Lorenzo Mattotti or Gahan Wilson.)